Perhaps the first outing with a Road Loco in all its glory??? Due to the sale of my 4" SC I am now without steam till we are finished so decided to show off what we have done so far.

My engine "His Majesty" ( see what I did with the topic here ) taken this wekend to a throughly enjoyable two day event at the Weald and Downland open air museum at Singleton, West Sussex. Organised by Micheal Webber from Burrell Engineering funnily enough in Shoreham this has grown in popularity from year to year. Being a true engine man (he was a good mate of the late Fred Dibnah) he has no qualms about engines doing what they were made to do and encourages lots of movement about the site all day. Somewhere in the region of 15 or so full size and at least 20 plus miniatures including a boggling 5 half size. They were a new SC Burrell a Burrell showmans a really nice Mac a Wallis and Stevens and a mouthwatering Devonshire Burrell which had good provenance form a run of 6 built in the 90's.

Had a good day on Saturday bumping into several fellow builders and we all said how pleased we w are with the kits and service so far. I am really bad a remembering names and despite having met all of them at least once before cant give them a name check ( I struggle to remember the kids or wife so dont be offended)Sadly the organ had an electrical glitch which meant it could play Sunday which damped my mood somewhat but still recieved lots of positive comments from passers by. Despite a quite informative sign explaining what is going on had a number of people commenting that "no wonder I was selling it as it looked like a lot of work left !!!!!!!!!" or the other one was "blimey how do you make all the bits needed to finish it??? " Bumped into the guy who restored "The President" a couple of years ago and he said how good the detail in the design is so that was nice to hear from an outsider.

A couple of people who still cast doubts on the ability of STW to "stay the course"!! which I soon put right and some who felt that the finish date of May ish next year was very optimistic.

Hopefully STW will prove them wrong and keep us on track so I can go back next year and steam around on what would have been the only Burrell DCC RL unless anyone else will come along once finished next year.

Oh and Steve, dont worry I told eveyone who spoke to me what a pleasure it is to build your own engine and gave a few flyers away as well

I too was at a rally this weekend with my brother (who was asked to take along his (bites) of engine). He received a lot of great feedback from the general public, fellow model builders and owners of full size engines.

We too were singing the praise of STW to those negative people from the former days (why do they do it ).

Hopefully, I will have a rolling chassie by mid-September when my engine has its first 'official' outing.

Once more of us get our engines finished and get them out on the rally field the word will quickly spread. I've spoken many people now who have built their engines from scratch, and kit and all hold STW in high regard.